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Dr. Temperance Brennan stared down at the paper in front of her, frowned, and crumpled the paper as she threw it into the trashcan.

"Score!" came the exclamatory remark as Booth sauntered into her office, "You know, with aim like that you should join a basketball team."

Brennan sighed, Booth was both the only and the last person she wanted to see tonight. She knew his appearance at her office was only a matter of time, however she had hoped to be finished with this task by now so that he wouldn't say anything about it.

Shooting him a withering glare, she set back to the task at hand.

Wanted, she wrote, forensic anthropologist major who is able to serve as an-

She stopped at the place that had been giving her troubles all afternoon. What did she want them to serve as? Her assistant? Her equal in the lab?

Each of those brought back scores of memories. Zack the assistant who gained confidence with each passing case until they worked together nearly as smoothly as she and Booth did. Zack the forensic anthropologist, who had earned his doctorate, shorn his hair, practiced his courtroom performances, gone off to Iraq- and then taken the word of a serial killer and killed a man.

She shook her head violently again, and again threw the wadded attempt into the trashcan.

"You writing a new book?" Booth asked from her couch, looking up from their most recent batch of unending paperwork.

She shook her head fiercely and sent him a look that she hoped warned him to back off. She was not in the mood for his teasing, nor his incessant prying.

"You need to go home," he told her, "Nobody would fault you and you need to get out of here."

"I'm staying," she said in no uncertain tone; she was determined to finish this tonight.

Booth set the paperwork down on the floor and picked up one of her earlier drafts that had missed the can, unfolding it so that he could see what she had been doing.

"Temperance," he said softly, placing the paper back in the can and walking around to her side of the desk, "Bones you don't have to do this now."

"I disagree," she countered, ignoring the smoldering brown eyes that were boring into her own.

"He's not even out of the hospital, Bones," Booth said calmly, rubbing her upper forearm, "Go home and rest for tonight, Bones."

"You are not my caretaker," she told him.

"Let me be your friend," he said.

"Look, Seeley Booth," she snapped as she scrambled for emotional equilibrium, "You may have miraculously 'risen' from the dead, but don't think that means you can barge in here after two weeks and start running my life again! I managed survive that long without you and I can survive again," she knew she might be hurting his feelings at this juncture , but she didn't care, "My world does not revolve around a single person, Booth- no person's life ever should. Because when that happens, it never ends well, do you understand, Booth? It never does! I survived your supposed death and I will survive this as well.

"I will," she repeated again, more softly to herself, "I will."

A pair of strong arms slipped around her and she fell instinctively on his chest. She hated that he was always there to see her at her lowest, and yet not one time had he criticized or mocked her- which was most likely why she allowed him to continue. Tears coursed down her face and soaked his shirt, but she was beyond her ability to stop herself.

"You are one of the strongest women I know, Bones, and you will survive this," he spoke into her hair, "But you won't heal tonight and you can't do it alone."

She nodded, sniffed, and disengaged herself from him before he could let go of her. She didn't think she could handle any sort of dismissal right now. He helped her gather her things and get into her jacket. He winced when he picked up her bag and she was reminded that he was still recovering from his injury.

"I'll take that," she told him gently, "And your briefcase as well."

He smiled and accepted her help without complaint.

"You know," he said as they walked out of the Jeffersonian toward his car, "Maybe you shouldn't advertise for a replacement at all."

She lifted a questioning eyebrow and waited for him to expound.

"I mean," he went on, "You're always talking about how you never know what to do with all of your grad students to further their practical experience levels- or something squinty like that- so why not use them? Then you can pick the one you like the most as the replacement- not that anyone could replace Zack, but- well, you know what I mean, right?"

She nodded, "The idea has merit," especially since it did not require her to form an emotional attachment right away to any one person, "I shall take it under consideration."

"It'll be like a jelly of the month club, and I'll help you pick your favorite in the end," he grinned broadly.

She laughed as they pulled into her apartment complex's parking lot- his colorful and often confusing analogies were something she had missed the last two weeks.

"And in order to give the students a more full experience," she decided suddenly, seeing a solution for the new discomfort she felt in coming to the lab every day and not having Zack there, "I shall leave them to handle most of the forensics work so that I can spend more time aiding you in the field."

"Sure Bones," he said, and she could tell he saw right through her ruse, "You do that for as long as you need to."

"Booth," she turned to him abruptly, as they reached her apartment door, "I am thankful that you weren't dead after all."

"I know," he smiled.

"Thank you," she told him, letting her eyes convey what her words could not.

He smiled again, touched his forehead as if tipping an invisible cap to her, and left.

"See ya tomorrow, Bones," he called over his shoulder.